State Representative Huberty discusses upcoming legislative session

State Representative Huberty discusses upcoming legislative session

Ahead of the next legislative session for the State of Texas which starts in January, State Representative District 127 Dan Huberty held a town hall meeting Nov. 14 to discuss important topics he plans to focus on this next session.

State Representative Huberty discusses upcoming legislative session

Ahead of the next legislative session for the State of Texas which starts in January, State Representative District 127 Dan Huberty held a town hall meeting Nov. 14 to discuss important topics he plans to focus on this next session.

Ahead of the next legislative session for the State of Texas which starts in January, State Representative District 127 Dan Huberty held a town hall meeting to discuss important topics he plans to focus on this next session.

Several residents were on hand Nov. 14 at Atascocita Middle School to find out what items may affect them and ask questions about some of the bills that are already prepared to be presented in January.

“We had a very tough time last session because the Comptroller released numbers before we want into the legislative session that we were facing a budget deficit of $27 billion,” Huberty said.

“We spent six months working to balance the budget without raising taxes. We had to make some cuts and tap into the rainy day fund which some people were against. We listened to what everyone had to say but in the end, I find it important to use the resources we have to pay our debts and not future funds.”

Huberty added that will not be the problem this session as they are already projecting a budget surplus but they will still have bills to deal such as the Medicaid bill the State of Texas is expecting to receive.

New to the legislative session is dozens of newly elected members which will need to be brought up to speed on bills and how the legislature works in regards to the budget.

Last session, there almost 6,000 bills filed and only 1,400 passed so they are expecting a lot more bills to be filed and introduced this year.

A large majority of the state’s budget goes toward Public Education and Health and Human Services.

Huberty has already talked with Lake Houston Area Chamber of Commerce representatives to see what issues they view important for this session.

“The LHACC and other community representatives I have spent time agree that education and workforce training is important. Not every student who is in our local school districts will go to college; that is way vocational training programs are important. We all want to make sure students who are graduating from our school districts have a future and will be successful,” Huberty said.

They also plan to look at taxation through property, margins, fees and royalty and sales taxes residents are faced with and how to mitigate the negative impact on the margins tax.

Another important subject during this session will be how to plan for the future in regards to plans to increase importation in the Houston Ship Channel, improvements to waterways and the Port of Houston and continued regulation on sand mine/ silt businesses along the San Jacinto river that are now overseen by the Texas Commission of Environmental Quality through House Bill 571.

Public school finance will also continue to be a hot button item since Huberty has already met with the Aldine, Alief, Humble and Huffman Independent School Districts to see what need to be done about equity and adequate school funding as well as too much testing for students.

“We have created a testing monster. There is something that needs to be done because it gets to the point where the teachers are just teaching to what might be covered on the STAAR test,” Huberty said.

“We have a lot of different irons in the fire this session; we plan to work efficiently and to do what is best for our communities.”